Pagan Culture

[shyuhe]

Looking good. Nice that we've got peace again. However we may want to start building some more military just to be on the safe side. I wouldn't be surprised if Brennus asked us to switch religion soon (or Saladin again).

I don't mind running a FE but it requires a lot of MM (more than I like to require in an SG). Ultimately, we'll probably be using the culture slider to push our cultural victory (through mature towns) so having cottages now isn't a bad thing. I wouldn't farm over cottages at this point but farming over new tiles wouldn't be bad. Some of the jungle cities have really nice land (and hills too).

Techwise, I'd go for machinery first, then the Sistine (music?). After that, the regular liberalism beeline with maybe nationalism? I guess the free tech is still to be determined... Also, if the Mausoleum is still available, I would consider building it. Longer GA's are good and we have marble. Plus artist pollution will be helpful in this game

Roster:
shyuhe (on deck)
yena
qwertz just played
Morganknight - UP
mystfly (lurking - let us know if you are able to sort out the asset issue)

 

[yena]

True, we need more specialists and a GP farm somewhere. I would also like to go the aesthetics route. We need drama, and GL wouldn't hurt either if we can get it. Machinery first makes sense for the military.

 

[Morganknight]

Got it. Will play tonight.

 

[Morganknight]

Thinking Thebes or Corinth for the GP farm. Someone else make the call.

Moai statues finished in Athens...Great Lighthouse is only 8 turns to build, so I start it. We have 5 coastal cities...and the potential for more if we ever decide to fill in.

We teched to Machinery and are now a turn away from Drama. If we want to build the Parthenon, we will need to get Mysticism>Polytheism at one turn of research each...

I make some trades with our opponents...a little extra gold might prove useful.

Our boats start stronger now. Noticing we have no navy, I commission a Trireme in Sparta...

I don't know whether this was the best decision or not, but after watching Saladin shoot his wad trying to take the city, I had to play cleanup and get the easy victory over the troops he had already injured. Worker enroute to bring the cows online...

I remembered to turn off all of the governor buttons this time before handing the game over.

 

[shyuhe]

This SG is really rolling along here Got it and will play shortly.

 

[shyuhe]

IT: There are some spies that have been hired so I fire them for scientists. Goth isn't in the best spot but it's not terrible. It takes land away from Brennus so that's always a plus.

Turn 144 - mysticism is in.

Turn 145 - poly is in.

Turn 146 - lit is in.

Turn 148 - compass is in. The lighthouse is completed in Athens. We also get a quest:

I don't know what the reward is but feel free to pursue it using Sparta if you want.

Trun 149 - drama is in.

Turn 150 - minor bad luck:

Turn 152 - music is in. We get the free GA.

Turn 153 - priesthood is in.

Turn 154 - monarchy is in. The ToA is completed in Tenochtitlan. A great spy is born It's from that 1 turn of running a spy specialist in Athens! I think it was well under 10% but *sigh*. We can burn him for a GA later.

Turn 155 - alpha is in. I sell it to Brennus and Saladin in hopes of keeping them at cautious but only Brennus moves up to cautious. We get 50 gold from Brennus and 40 gold from Saladin. It was taking them way too long to research it...

Thoughts: We're way ahead in tech compared to Brennus. Saladin is doing a little better as he at least has feudalism. Still, we'll be miles ahead of him in tech and we have a lot more land too. I designated Tenochtitlan and Athens as legendary cities as they look to have the best production for wonders right now. Tenochtitlan is building the GL (I'm surprised it's still available) and Athens is starting construction of the Mausoleum. I don't know if we have a good third city for legendary yet - maybe Bibracte with the double holy city Brennus built the Temple of Solomon during this set so it looks like a good city (although we'll have to hope for natural spreads of religion).

I've also started construction of the HE in Teoihuacan (I think). That city should just be left on permanent military pump after that, together with the coastal city to the SW (blanking on the name here). Otherwise our empire is in great shape. While I want to go and take out Brennus, I think we should just wait until he asks us to convert at this point (if he even does...). I have to say, I'm disappointed with the lack of requests for conversion here I probably should have made the game emperor pangaea now that I think about it...

Here's the tech screen:

I think engineering next (Notre Dame) may be nice. Brennus stole the stone to our south so we can't build it super cheap but I'm sure we can work around that The Colossus was built in a far away land - there is one big civ on the other continent but I can't tell who it is yet. If I had to guess, I'd say Justinian. I have also not seen any new religions founded yet Has anybody seen Taoism being founded? If not, we can't pursue liberalism

 

[shyuhe]

And the roster:

shyuhe just played
yena - UP
qwertz (on deck)
Morganknight

 

[qwertz]

I agree that the game is almost won ATM as both brenus and saladin are not a real threat anymore, they might be a super-power on the other continent that could compete against us, but I don't think we will have any serious problems with it.
We have 2 quests to solve, I think it might be interesting to solve them as an extra challenge.


And the rewards for the quests:

Spoiler :

Horse Whispering
Prereq: ANIMAL_HUSBANDRY AND Horse resource
Obsolete: NATIONALISM or PRINTING_PRESS or EDUCATION or GUNPOWDER or ASTRONOMY
Active/Weight: 25/500
Aim:
Build default number of players for this world size stables (7 for standard)
Result:
1.you get default number of players for this world size Horse Archers (6 for standard)
2.All mounted units get the Sentry promotion
3.All stables provide +1 food

Spoiler :

Quest13:
Warships
Prereq: SAILING and METAL_CASTING AND Map has at least 55% water tiles
Obsolete: NATIONALISM or PRINTING_PRESS or EDUCATION or GUNPOWDER or ASTRONOMY
Active/Weight: 35/200
Aim:
Build default number of players for this world size Triremes (7 for standard)
Result:
1.All Trireme units gain the Combat 1 promotion
2.IF you control the Great Lighthouse all harbors gain +2 commerce

I think the +1 food for the stables will pay off quite well.
Do we actually have finished the Great Lighthouse? If so the second quest might be good too.

 

[yena]

Got it for tomorrow.

 

[shyuhe]

Yes I finished the lighthouse during my set. I guess both quests will boost our power rating so they'll be nice. Now that I think about it, Brennus may not be requesting that we change religions because we have more power than him.

 

[yena]

I had a quiet set. After Engineering I got Horse Riding (only 2 turns) to be able to build stables for the quest. Sparta kept building triremes, and the military city finished HE and pumped out a few macemen and pikes for protection. We got the Mausoleum, Great Library, and we are now building the Parthenon and Notre Dame. I decided to make Corinth our GP farm, and have almost completed the National Epic there.

After Horse Riding I researched Optics to get a few caravels out, getting the bonus and checking out the AIs overseas. I haven't found them yet. Since someone had discovered Taoism I researched Philosophy followed by Paper for the Liberalism race. However, we got a GE, and I put research to Nationalism (no beakers invested yet), since I think we could use the GE for Taj Mahal. We should soon decide which the city will be our third legendary city, and build the Hermitage there.

Brennus and Saladin are still far behind and unwilling to cause trouble

I played one turn too many, sorry about that

 

[qwertz]

Got it, but before playing on I think there are some things to discuss;
1. 3rd legendary city; we have a GA sitting around, which isn't really optimal. The best thing to do ATM is settling him in the 3rd legendary city. If we want the sladins double holly city as legendary we should get it ASAP.
My favorite would be Corinth as the farmed GAs generate some culture too.
2. Future plans; Brenus and Saladin will have to go sooner or later. We have a nice tech lead on them, so after liberalism we might start thinking about war. We could go the classical rifling route, but we still need the whole feudalism-baking route for it. The other option would be self-researching gunpowder, getting military tradition from liberalism and crushing them with cuirassiers. They would also make a good use of all those stables we build for the quest.

 

[shyuhe]

The funny thing is, Corinth will probably be unable to catch up to the GP production of Tenochtitlan and Athens (from wonders). We'll probably be lucky to get an artist or two. However any artists that we get should be saved at this point - it will help speed up the victory.

I'm surprised you haven't been able to find the other AI. The biggest AI last I checked had around 18-20% of the world's land so there should be a pretty big landmass out there...

We may have to re-try this variant on pangaea emperor to spice things up as this game is turning out to be a little too easy

shyuhe
yena just played
qwertz - UP
Morganknight (on deck)

 

[shyuhe]

I see the cross-post. Mounted units will probably be the fastest way of crushing Brennus/Saladin. We probably have enough for a small one-move stack. We can use 3-4 cities to produce mounted units and upgrade those into cuirassiers or cavalry.

I'm not so sure about settling the GA for culture. That's 12 cpt each turn (without multipliers) compared to 4k from a bomb. So the game needs to last another 333 turns to break even. With 100% (hermitage), it's 24 cpt so 166 turns. If we get up to 150% (hermitage + cathedral), it's 30 cpt so 133 turns. And that's assuming the hermitage + cathedrawl are instantly built. I think at this point of the game, it's better to hold on to them to speed up the culture later with bombs.

 

[qwertz]

You forgot free speech and and Siestine , and setteled GAs also produce 3 base & /turn.

 

[shyuhe]

Hmm... well gold/beaker from a GA isn't going to speed up our victory more than a turn or two. So let's just look at FS/Sistine. That makes the base culture 15 for the GA.

Base = 266 turns
100% (FS) = 133 turns
200% (FS+hermitage) = 88 turns
250% (FS+hermitage+cathedral) = 77ish.

So if we can figure out the 3rd city, then it will probably pay off to settle now. The question is if we want to use Corinth or use Brennus' double holy city as legendary #3. If it's the latter, we should declare war in the next 10-20 turns to take it ASAP. Either option is fine with me.

 

[yena]

I was thinking Corinth myself. We could research Nationalism and build the hermitage there at once, and then employ lots of artists. With the help of some settled GA it should catch up eventually.

 

[shyuhe]

Corinth works but if we settle the GA there, we should commit to using it as the 3rd city. How does the rest of the team feel about it? Sistine + artist = 7 (or was it 6) base culture so it's almost as good as a town running 100% culture (and probably easier since it's independent of the slider).

 

[yena]

Don't forget that we have a GE to spend on a suitable wonder there as well.

 

[qwertz]

Ok, if there aren't any disagreements I'll settle the GA in Corinth, tech Nationalism, build Taj Mahal and Hermitage there and tech further towards liberalism.